Aydin is a deeply flawed human being. He is condescending, manipulative, phony, he thinks of himself as profound when in fact he is shallow. He mistakes his selfishness for altruism, he expects nothing in return but ardently seeks personal gain or comfort. He finds his encounters with the tenants embarrassing, he avoids them like the plague, yet he doesn't miss a chance to mockingly assert his superiority. He wants to appear modest yet he will accept any words of praise or will turn others' shame into his moment of glory. He is friendly to the tourists not because he is kind but because it gives him a sense of gratification. He writes for the local newspaper to satisfy his intellectual side but doesn't want to go write for a bigger newspaper; maybe it's because the number of readers he has is of no importance to him or maybe it's because he is at a safe distance from critics or a significantly larger number of intelligent readers who would see right through him. He is controlling and possessive over his wife Nihal, pretending to offer her freedom and a marriage of equal footing. He lives in a bubble that he can govern to his liking. He is a chameleon that changes his appearance and identity according to his needs, environment and the people he interacts with.Still, Aydin is a human being. He is flawed but being flawed is part of being human. He thinks he's the master of his thoughts but by the end he realizes he's the servant. His chameleon personality seems to be his way of surviving, the only way he knows how to engage. He's afraid, afraid of being alone, afraid of losing contact, afraid of losing his identity, afraid of falling into despair. He's engaged in many activities in an attempt to fill the void that's crushing him. He is desperate for empathy. He seems lost, without a purpose. Is it selfish to not want to be alone? Should he be blamed for being wealthy? Should he be blamed for following his own interests? What constitutes a good deed? Is a good deed done for personal gain any less good? Why come out of the bubble? Nuri Bilge Ceylan presents these questions to his characters (and audience), first to break their false sense of reality and then to torment their souls.The characterizations are so rich and the characters so layered that the level of access the audience is given to these characters is staggering, and potentially frightening as it may reveal unpleasant things about our nature. The quiet moments of solitude, the long, unbroken conversations that continually evolve, the many feelings that are felt, all make the characters seem very real and true to life. Aydin is a fully realized character, developed in a fully engrossing way; at the beginning we think he's a great person, then we see how flawed he can be, and by the end he sees that himself. The same goes for Nihal, a depressed woman whose marriage seems to make her life fade away and whose idea of fulfillment involves finding solace anywhere but in said marriage. Necla, Aydin's sister, is described by vanity and burdened by her divorce. In contrast, the tenants family, having material problems (they're poor), seems free of any emotional burdens. Ismail, even if a drunk who treats his wife and boy harshly, has a very clear mind. He previously went to prison but what he did he considered just; he didn't hesitate when Nihal came to him to offer money. He and his wife have found their purpose in raising their child. Hamdi, Ismail's brother and the local imam, has found solace in God, his mother in prayer. Ilyas, the young boy, in a crucial moment, says he wants to be a cop when he grows up, something Nihal struggles to understand. Protecting the moral values of this society, deciding what's right or wrong, separating the bad from the good, is something that makes sense only to those clear of mind; to those solely concerned with their self, clouded by feeble concerns and contradictory notions and to those lacking a purpose, it does not.The coming of the winter could signify purification and clarity of the mind, something Aydin lacks at the beginning and seems to almost achieve, or realize he lacks, by the end (as it appears from the apologetic narration at the end, the only element of the film that seems to be out of place as the images already conveyed what the words in the narration expressed). Yet, as the title implies, this is only a phase, a winter sleep; spring will follow soon enough, the tourists will come pouring in, and the chameleon will no longer be exposed by the whiteness of the snow - it will instead blend in with the greens and grays and muddy colors of society and of self's painted caverns. All will be as it was, an indistinguishable landscape, as part of an endless, inescapable cycle.Winter Sleep is a fantastic movie, a stunning character study that provides poignant social commentary and insight into the human nature. It is about social division, ego, marriage, loneliness, morality, doubt and about so much more that awaits to be discovered.Conscience is but a word that cowards use,Devised at first to keep the strong in awe.
Tiff 2014 capsule - film 2I took the train from Paris to Milan a long time ago and I remember looking out the window at the majestic mountains admiring them, of course, but it wasn't until we got into Northern Italy that I found them beautiful and alive. It was there that real life was sprinkled throughout the mountains, with clotheslines everywhere and junkyards and swing sets. It was there that I loved those mountains.Give Nuri Bilge Ceylan the most beautiful setting in the world and he will show you the clotheslines. It is why I trust him. I will listen to anything he wants to tell me because I know that whatever story he tells, it will be true. He is one of the few writers (along with his co-writer spouse Ebru Ceylan) from whom I will take pronouncements on life and meaning and philosophy, not because he says things that have not been said before, but because he knows how to say them. His talent is an astute sense of observation. He knows what it sounds like when real people think big ideas. Many writers and directors think that big ideas should be the point of a film or its theme, and they get wrapped up in their ideas, filling the film with Symbolism and Metaphor and other such things I have difficulty digesting. Ceylan doesn't want to present majesty. He doesn't want to be clever. He doesn't want to show off. He wants to honour people and how they live. He wants to show people as they are. People who argue, people who are alone, people who have grand ideas, people who lie, people who manipulate, people who get caught and feel shame. His characters are true because they are real. And like real people, they have ideas. Some think pride is everything, others believe charity is most important virtue, some wonder if forgiveness might be the answer to everything while some think there are too many bleeding hearts in the world. Still others just want to see the end of the day without ruffling any feathers. The magic of Winter Sleep is that these very real people interact the way very real people interact and watching them is as captivating an experience as I am likely to ever get out of a film. Ceylan loves real people, flaws and all, and it shows in the care he takes with his characters. It helps that his actors are some of the best I have ever seen, but perhaps their task is made simpler because their words are words that could be spoken naturally. Ceylan keeps it real. It is why I trust him.
What began as modest camaraderie for Aydin, the film's amiable lead gradually deteriorated into a sense of shame, not of him but of myself. To be clear I have never been nor ever will be a wealthy, dogmatic landlord repossessing the furniture of my tenants for paying their medical bills instead of rent, yet I could see myself identifying with much of Aydin's disposition. He is educated, cultured, inviting, and well-spoken, and, most importantly, he is reasonable. I say that knowing that he is in actuality quite disagreeable, but the danger of someone with all these traits is that it is so easy to buy into the idea that someone this Intelligent, this Conversational, this Reasonable, is someone who is suited to deciding for others. Such assumption is seemingly natural, tautological, after all why wouldn't you accept someone this well-bred as a leader for one's community?This is, of course, just an assumption, one that presumes he has everyone's best interests at heart. And in a way he does, or at least he believes he does from his own singular perspective, unaware of the blinders that conceal those in the periphery. Conflict, disasters, people, these become just numbers and so are stripped of any significance, his community reduced to the same 12-point font opinion sections that he so eagerly writes, forever, and expects his tenants to read; big fish, small pond.Bourgeois values are easy to internalize, in fact pushed on us to believe that anybody can transcend class boundaries by just "culturing themselves". In turn, "cultured" individuals are naturally greater individuals, leaders and innovators and taste-makers that guide others to a greater place. It is a massive trap I fell into during college, thinking that I could be accepted into the desired upper-class with enough literacy in academia, arts, media, etc. This is, of course, not true at all, it is only possible if you were born into wealth, but it didn't stop me from trying and wasting some of my best years from being some of my most misguided. To that degree I understand Aydin's outlook, that sophistication is a virtue which evaluates him higher than the unrefined around him and so every decision he makes implicitly is for their betterment too. I now also understand what a pathetic outlook this is and, as Winter Sleep's 3 hours and 16 minutes slowly strip away at Aydin's agreeable airs, I see that at heart is a sad individual who hoards his cultural literacy, who clings to it not out of any genuine passion but as mere validation of his trifling existence.Meaning comes not from the notional but the mutual, at least for me. What is the point of literacy if not to express and develop ideas with others? I can read all the books, play all the games, watch all the film in the world and it would mean little without discourse, debate, dialogue, all the information in my head but no one to share any of it with. There are, if I can say it, too many Aydins in this world and on this site typing away at their 12-point font opinion pieces who care only about the appearance of being literate and the clout that comes with such affectation. I know because I was very much one of them. And, if I'm being completely honest, perhaps still am to some degree. Sharing my passions with others has helped immensely with keeping me much more honest.
